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The Sunday Magazine

Geoengineering for climate change

Canadian environmental engineer David Keith, now at Harvard University, makes the case for researching geoengineering - shooting sulphur particles into the stratosphere to reflect the sun's energy back to space.
CBC Radio ·
As the term implies, geoengineering is engineering on a planetary scale. It involves attempting to arrest the course of climate change through mega-projects - by seeding the atmosphere with reflective particles, for example, or by putting gigantic mirrors in orbit around the Earth to reflect sunlight back to space, or by fertilizing the ocean with iron to stimulate the growth of carbon-absorbing plankton.

Canadian environmental engineer David Keith, now at Harvard University, makes the case for researching geoengineering - shooting sulphur particles into the stratosphere to reflect the sun's energy back to space. He admits it makes him queasy and that it could possibly do more harm than good, but, he says, we can't afford not to investigate it.

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